


Making Sense of First Order Designations

by Gamebird



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: First Order, Meta, behind the curtain, star wars meta, world-building
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-23
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2020-01-24 08:39:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18567811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gamebird/pseuds/Gamebird
Summary: This is an attempt to impose order on the semi-random-appearing trooper designations used in the First Order.





	Making Sense of First Order Designations

**Author's Note:**

> Created as background primarily for the Grey Order series. But I make it available here to other writers who might want something other than grabbing letters and numbers at random.

First Order designations

All citizens have a designation, even named officers (lieutenant and above). Those who graduate from officer academies or engineering schools never use their designation for anything but paperwork. Enlisted troopers gain the privilege of using a name (one claimed name they provide themselves, although if they know their family name, they can use it as well for two names) as their official address upon promotion to a commissioned officer (lieutenant and above). Same for technicians who reach a high enough rank in their own hierarchy. Naming is not required but keeping the designation in place of a name is rare.

The assignment of designations began in 5 ABY to catalogue those assembled from the imperial remnants. First wave inductees had the letter 'A' followed by one or two letters for the ship they arrived in (with the primary ones being derived from ship's name;  _Eclipse_  was E,  _Absolution_  was AB,  _Imperialis_  was I; designations were somewhat random and poorly controlled), followed by a one to five-digit number with the highest rank getting the lowest numbers. Individual admissions (people who arrived as something other than the recognized crew of a ship) omitted the ship letter(s) and used numbers assigned by calendar date of joining.

Each successive year used sequential lettering for the first letter. 'X' was skipped as a starting letter, as it was reserved for slaves. When the system rolled over to start the alphabet again in 26 ABY, the old A-Z was designated as prime (preceded in records by a 1-) and the next as second (also called current; preceded in records as a 2-). The prime/current status is not spoken as the twenty-six or more year age gap is considered obvious. This letter rollover coincides with Snoke's ascension to leader of the Order. Some say, 'A prime or A Snoke?'

Ship designations were used heavily in years B, C, and D but sporadically thereafter as individual admissions predominated and the Order was unable to bring very many new ships into their fold. Note that the  _Eclipse_  called out as E in year A is not the same as the  _Excellence_  called out as E in year B. Regular graduations of internally-educated recruits did not outnumber adult admissions until years R and S.

* * *

Internally-educated recruits

First letter = Year of graduating class. Roughly 250,000 people graduate per year at the time of TFA/TLJ. This letter is not assigned until graduation from final advanced education. Slaves or dropouts are assigned X. Most years have a theme of some kind for the letter, with different themes for military and technicians. Current year F was 'Footsoldiers of the Order'. Troopers and workers graduate two to three years sooner (around age 16) than officers and engineers/skilled technicians (18-19).

Second letter = Assigned legion or work corps at time of graduation from basic education when children are sorted into profession based on test scores (families can influence career path). There are roughly 10,000 persons per legion or corps. Numbers are massaged up or down as needed, as there are not more than 26 legions/corps per year. When assigning legion/corps letter, care is taken not to duplicate the four-digit numbers in the same legion/corps. That is, although there may be twenty-five 2187s in a graduating class, no two of them will be placed in the same legion or corps.

Legions are military (15% officers, 85% troopers). Work corps are technicians (15% engineers/skilled technicians, 85% workers). Each graduating class usually contains 1-5% of the population unable to graduate, usually for behavioral/disciplinary reasons. These receive an XX- designation upon discharge and are slaves. (Note that not everyone with an X in the second letter is a slave – only XX-.)

Four-digit number = where you fall in a rolling 10,000 person count. If you have zeroes at the beginning of your four-digit sequence, these are not omitted. Omitted digits are only for individual admission to the First Order (an adult who joined up and not as part of a ship's crew). G-52 would be the fifty-second person to join in year G. If there was any doubt if they were G-prime or G-current, it would be 2-G-52. They would not be 2-G-0052, as that would be an ungraduated trooper or worker.

The four-digit number is assigned upon completion of intake – the child or infant is assessed, registered, and biometric information is loaded under their initial designation. Given that designations are assigned sequentially, this means people with numerically close designations tend to be from the same planet.

Four-digit numbers are followed by a two-digit creche number which is dropped upon graduation from basic education (about age twelve). This is the same time they pick up a letter that precedes their four-digit number. So Finn went from 2187-44 to N-2187. Children extrapolate their expected graduation date and sometimes try to add an extra letter to sound 'grown up'.

Creche numbers indicate which small class group a youngling is assigned to. There are further divisions made for convenience of tracking and teaching, sometimes labeled with colors, directions, stars, or shapes. These are not part of their designations. Children are frequently shuffled around between groups as needed for activities or find a better match for their demonstrated capabilities.

The only time designations change is upon enslavement and even then, the system still tracks the original designation, but for all applications and naming purposes, XX is used. There are more than ten thousand slaves in the First Order, which is why the system continues to track by original designation even if no one allows them the dignity of using it when addressing them.

* * *

Nicknames and insults

It is considered mildly insulting to address someone you don't know well by only their number (the implication being they are a slave, a child, or don't have a unit where they belong). Calling them by only the letters is not insulting. Nicknames exist and are frowned upon by the higher ranks. They are not allowed in 'on duty' applications per the Manual of Decorum.

Other prejudice is that the lower ranks are thought not to deserve names or that they haven't earned them. It is thought to instill a dangerous sense of individualism. But people are lazy and use nicknames anyway – just when they won't get caught or taken to task for it. The only valid nickname is self-chosen or approved by the individual. You don't get to label other people and attempting to do so is considered offensive. Of course it still happens anyway as a form of social dominance.

The official disapproval meant nicknames grew to be something one only allowed one's closest associates to use – direct battle buddies, mates, and friends – and generally in private. This custom migrated upward in the social ranks into the officer corps. First names became similarly restricted, with it being a sign of honor to be allowed to address an officer by their first name. Full names are known and not restricted from being stated (with the exception of Ben Solo), but it's considered unspeakably rude to call someone by their first name when not allowed.

Other insulting name-related things include calling someone by their designation when they have a name, or calling them by a name they have renounced. It is common for those entering the First Order as adults to give up their old name as a show of loyalty to the cause and a symbolic manner of leaving their old life behind. To continue to call them by that name indicates a lack of belief in their sincerity. Calling them by their designation instead of their name is pretending they don't deserve the name.

Terms of endearment (honey, sweetie, love, babe) or loose affiliation (buddy, pal, guys, amigas, the gang, my boys, etc.) are uncommon and discouraged in all public venues and prohibited in the course of duty. People use them anyway in private. It is another social marker of familiarity and trust – carefully given and not casually applied.

* * *

How this works in practice:

  * Everyone who graduated in Finn's year starts with F, which means most of them were born within a year of 11 ABY if troopers or workers, or born around 9 ABY if they graduated from officer or engineering training.
  * Finn graduated with a quarter million other F's. The legion of 10,000 (8,500 troopers, 1,500 officers) he graduated in was N.
  * Finn's best bet of finding others from his home planet would be locating other F_-2100-2250 people. Maybe G, maybe E. The second letter doesn't matter for this purpose as it is more or less randomly assigned on graduation.
  * Finn's full system designation as an adult would be 2-FN-2187-44. (Assuming a creche number of 44 as above.)
  * Poe's offensiveness or not in TFA is all tangled up in Finn knowing Poe isn't from his culture, them being in a life-or-death situation, Finn never having come up with or been given a nickname of his own, Finn renouncing the Order and needing a new name, and Poe being clearly well-intentioned with his words and behavior. But this usually plays a role in my Gingerpilot, as Poe blunders around rudely and Hux finds himself too charmed by Poe's ignorance to correct him.
  * A legion mobilized and assigned to a star destroyer will have all troopers of the same two starting letters and the full range of numbers, with officers who are two to three letters before them. The highest level officers will be further back on the initial letter, but all will share the second letter.
  * Transfers do not change one's designation (nothing does except getting a name or being reduced to a slave). But it definitely makes you stand out in the new group, unless you're in a reconstituted legion where everyone is from different groups.
  * Armitage Hux would be 1-V_-____-__. Because we all know what V stands for.
  * Rae Sloane and Brendol Hux would be AI-1 and AI-2, followed by whatever other adults were aboard the  _Imperialis_  after the Battle of Jakku.
  * Older people whose designations begin with A and B are usually original imperials. Edrison Peavey is an A-year member because he was in the original fleet that moved to the Unknown Regions (AAB- for  _Absolution_ ). Tritt Opan is a B-year member because he was in the  _Acidity_ , which was part of the Queluhan Nebula remnant, recruited and integrated in the second year (BA- for  _Acidity_ ).
  * Older people with C through R were not born in the Order, though as the letters get further down, they were probably educated in it.
  * Letters past S don't know any life outside the Order, which means at the time of TFA/TLJ, there are a good fourteen years of people (which make up a disproportionate percentage of the population) who know nothing of the galaxy at large except what they've been told by intentionally biased sources.



* * *

Sources:

  * US army ranks: <https://www.military.com/army/officer-ranks.html>
  * Comic excerpts about FN from the Finn comics: <https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/111958/does-fn-stand-for-or-mean-anything>
  * General military structure among stormtroopers (pay special attention to the Protocol section): <https://sw1mush.fandom.com/wiki/Stormtrooper>
  * Quora’s best stab at what the designations mean: <https://www.quora.com/What-do-the-Stormtrooper-designations-TK-FN-etc-stand-for>
  * Reddit’s best stab at it: <https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWars/comments/38353i/i_have_a_question_my_friends_what_does_the_tk/>
  * Chuck Wendig’s Aftermath, Life Debt, in which there is a single throwaway reference to the Imperial Manual of Decorum provided by Sinjir, former imperial loyalty officer whose job included punishing infractions.
  * My own stuff. Star Performer chapter, Charity Work for population breakdown and assumptions: <https://archiveofourown.org/works/16147544/chapters/38097335>
  * More of my stuff. General educational background and culture from Orderly Lives: <https://archiveofourown.org/works/13502735/chapters/30967154>




End file.
